On the side of the public library in the biggest city in the least religious state in the U.S., the Virgin Mary holds the infant Christ.
“Black Freedom, Black Madonna & the Black Child of Hope,” a 16-by-12-foot mural on the south-facing exterior wall of the Fletcher Free Library in Burlington, Vermont, is the creation of Raphaella Brice, a 26-year-old Haitian American artist who is drawing deep from the font of her cultural identity and faith. In the process, she’s injecting new spiritual energy into a state often imagined to be strictly secular.
According to Raphaella, her vocation started in the womb. By chance, her mother saw a documentary about the Renaissance artist Raphael on PBS. “She was fascinated by his story and named me Raphael. It was the hospital that added the…
